


for certainty, for meaning, you.

by cartographicalspine



Series: refuge for a flock [4]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Angst, Gen, Introspection, Self-Doubt, Self-Esteem Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-02
Updated: 2018-10-02
Packaged: 2019-07-23 14:56:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16161194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cartographicalspine/pseuds/cartographicalspine
Summary: Sebastian goes out for the first time after the dark events beneath the Harimann estate. Post Repentance quest.





	for certainty, for meaning, you.

**Author's Note:**

> Hawke goes by they/them pronouns here.

When Hawke asked for his company on an excursion outside the city, Sebastian jumped on it without hesitance not a heartbeat after reading the last word in the message.

Perhaps it was foolish and irreverent of him, but there was something that felt Maker given about those otherwise impromptu and disorganized adventures in and around Kirkwall. And...perhaps he liked getting outside of the Chantry to see what was beyond its pristine walls. He loved being among the bustle of ordinary, everyday folk, living their ordinary, everyday lives, the movement of the streets and alleys, and the constant, pulsing thrum of its energy permeating Kirkwall from the foundations upward. He might admit that he even enjoyed the chaos of it, though that delved into territory he couldn’t bring himself to think about. Not here with Grand Cleric Elthina, not with the way she could read him like a book, one written in a language he himself couldn’t understand. She told him what was written there, but it never made sense to him.

_That is not entirely true._

No, he understood a little, but only when it was ever too late to use that knowledge. She had known about the mercenary company, and she had warned him, had she not? And again with the Harimanns and the Vael throne, and he’d been too blind to see it until he charged into another ugly lesson he wished he hadn’t learned. Like a bedtime tale from his governess, only instead of leaving him drowsy and confused about talking forest animals who were not possessed it made him sit in the sanctuary late into the night.

The possession part had translated, at the least. Lady Harimann, for all her jealousy and bitterness, he could never have imagined as someone to consort with demons. That was something that mages did, and yet she had and Hawke hadn’t. Maker, _Hawke._ He had dragged them into this mess with him because of his own insistent need to do what he thought he should, instead of listening to advice and reason.

And now there were more doubts and uncertainties than before, and he was too afraid to think about them until Hawke’s business gave him the chance to get away. Each step between him and Hightown added to the distance between him and the Harimann estate, though he was more than aware of the separation between him and the Chantry as well. It was a thread persistently tugging at the back of his mind whenever he followed Hawke, yet today it seemed more acute to him than before.

At least Varric had stopped commenting on his moodiness, though that could have been chalked up to his newfound enjoyment in his conversation with Anders on what to do with his erstwhile brother once he managed to track him down. They were...gleefully specific on the details of Bartrand’s punishment. Also unrealistic, but they assured him that this was the joy in it.

He almost told them matter-of-fact that in practice, vengeance was not as satisfying as it seemed. It was another passion, another desire that had been twisted up as the demon had done with Lady Harimann’s desire, as his foolishness had done with his desire for answers. He almost spoke, but then he realized that chastising them wasn’t something he actually wanted to do. What he wanted was—

“Could you come up here a moment, Sebastian? I might need your help.”

—here.

Their hair tangled by the wind coming off the sea, their clothes faded by use and wear, squinting against the harsh light of the sun, Hawke nonetheless looked like all the certainty that Sebastian had left in his life. He had no idea where the thought had come from, and he had no idea what to do with it. But they were smiling at him despite all of Sebastian’s doubts and weaknesses, all the questions and fears he had confessed, the darkness he had charged into beneath the Harimann estate. So Sebastian shrugged his pack off and, with his burden shed, stepped into the light to follow that little thread where it might lead him, if only for today.


End file.
